Season series: This is the second of three meetings. The Blues won in overtime at home on Jan. 27. Minnesota looks to extend its home winning streak against St. Louis to three games.

Big story: The Wild hope to build off a dramatic come-from-behind shootout victory against the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday as they aim for their first Northwest Division title in franchise history. The Blues are battling for a playoff spot and try to break their current three-game losing streak.

Team Scope:

Blues: St. Louis is coming off a much-needed three days rest as it looks ahead to the Wild at Xcel Energy Center on Monday. It will also have a new face on the blue line as general manager Doug Armstrong sent 2013 second-round and conditional fifth-round NHL Draft picks to the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday in exchange for veteran defenseman Jordan Leopold.

The Blues will try to smooth out their recent rough patch following a hard-fought loss to the Kings this past Thursday. The Blues hung in there for most of the game thanks to a pair of goals by Vladimir Tarasenko, but couldn't stop Mike Richards from jamming the puck home in traffic during the closing minutes of regulation as they fell 4-2 for their third straight loss. The play was reviewed by the video team in Toronto and was eventually deemed a good goal.

"It was not good because [the] team [lost]," Tarasenko told NHL.com regarding his first multi-goal game since opening night. "It doesn't matter how many goals we score and how many games you make, it's all about the win. We don't have selfish players on our team. We're just thinking about wins."

Wild: With wins in eight of its last nine games, Minnesota is among the hottest teams in the Western Conference. And having won four in a row at home, the Wild are playing with a ton of confidence heading into their game Monday. The old adage that success breeds more success rung true Saturday when the Wild battled back from a 3-1 deficit to eventually defeat the Kings 4-3 in the shootout. Forward Charlie Coyle chipped away at the lead with a highlight-reel backhander goal from his knees in the second before Zach Parise sent it to overtime with a power-play goal in the third period. It marked the second home game in a row in which the Wild came back to win the game in extras.

"All I can say is just huge amounts of character," Wild coach Mike Yeo told reporters following the exciting win. "It's back-to-back games, [the Wild fans] sitting here waiting for us, down 3-1 against a team that doesn't give you much and you've got to fight for every inch that you get on the ice. So just a great job by our guys."

Who's hot: For St. Louis, Alex Pietrangelo has a goal and five assists in his past five games against Minnesota. ... Parise has eight points (four goals, four assists) in his past six contests for Minnesota.

Injury report: For the Blues, Jamie Langenbrunner is out for the season with a hip injury. ... For the Wild, forward Torrey Mitchell missed the game Saturday with an undisclosed illness. Goalie Josh Harding is dealing with the effects of multiple sclerosis, but was practicing last week.

March 28, 2013, 1:58pmMonday’s (April 1) Blues game at Minnesota men’s will be televised on FOX Sports Midwest Plus due to overlap with the Cardinals opening night game on FOX Sports Midwest. Below are channel numbers for FOX Sports Midwest Plus.

FOX Sports Midwest Plus is a channel used by FOX Sports Midwest to simultaneously show multiple events on two channels. FOX Sports Midwest Plus is available to all video providers that carry FOX Sports Midwest. Some providers carry FOX Sports Midwest Plus as a 24-hour full-time channel. Others choose to offer selected FOX Sports Midwest Plus programming and designate a channel to show the events.Note: Some cable providers outside the St. Louis area may choose not to carry Monday’s Blues game.

Wait, the Blues game starts at 8, and the Cardinals game starts at 10:10, why the hell are we on FSMW+? Can't they do the Cardinals pre-game on FSMW+ and then the actual game on FSMW when the Blues game ends?

Wait, the Blues game starts at 8, and the Cardinals game starts at 10:10, why the hell are we on FSMW+? Can't they do the Cardinals pre-game on FSMW+ and then the actual game on FSMW when the Blues game ends?

I wondered this myself. No official reasoning from FSMW given, that I can find at least. Since it is St. Louis (BASEBALL HEAVEN), I'm assuming they'll pull more viewers having the Cardinals stuff on the main channel the whole time instead of having everyone flip over after the Blues game ends. It sucks, but you aren't going to beat baseball in St. Louis.

Wait, the Blues game starts at 8, and the Cardinals game starts at 10:10, why the hell are we on FSMW+? Can't they do the Cardinals pre-game on FSMW+ and then the actual game on FSMW when the Blues game ends?

I wondered this myself. No official reasoning from FSMW given, that I can find at least. Since it is St. Louis (BASEBALL HEAVEN), I'm assuming they'll pull more viewers having the Cardinals stuff on the main channel the whole time instead of having everyone flip over after the Blues game ends. It sucks, but you aren't going to beat baseball in St. Louis.

Exactly, they will draw a better rating for pre and post game cardinal coverage then they do an actual hockey game. They also charge much more for advertising spots during anything cardinal related then they do for commercials during Blues broadcasts. I'm sure it's in the pricing/contracts that the programming be carried on the regular channel.

Great performance tonight. They could have folded up after the Elliott softy, but he got it together, and the scoring came out. Time to get Bouwmeester in the uni and see if anyone else is going to get traded.

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